At any rate, when I get Server Busy I usually have been able to recover by using the File -> Reset TiVo Web Server menu option. It's a lot more convenient than rebooting the TiVo. Hopefully this new code does the recovery automatically. I'll give it a try today.

I'm still getting lots of Server Busy return codes. But I think that's because my WD expander is going bad. E.g. it sometimes takes 3 or 4 attempts at booting (doing a power cycle each time) before I get the TiVo critter splash movie. Most of the time it goes to a blank gray screen instead.

Anyway, with the v0p7j version I still have Server Busy, but the transfer will sometimes recover. For example, one file succeeded on the 4th retry. Once a transfer starts properly, it will always run to completion. It never hangs up in the middle.

So my initial reaction is that the retry code has helped. I've been able to retrieve all my programs off the TiVO and will replace the HD soon.

I am brand new to kmttg, and wow, how cool! I am having a minor issue. The Auto Transfers are not getting placed in the location I have specified in the ".mpg Output Dir". I have the configuration set to decrypt and QS Fix. When I manually run a show, it works as expected, and the file gets processed into the .mpg Output Dir. but Auto Transfers dont, the stay in the .Tivo Output Dir. I am gonna search the thread, but this question might be tricky to find...thanks!

Oh yeah, and I am running the auto transfers as a service, and the service runs under an account that has access to everything. The mpg Output Dir is a network drive mapping.

I am brand new to kmttg, and wow, how cool! I am having a minor issue. The Auto Transfers are not getting placed in the location I have specified in the ".mpg Output Dir". I have the configuration set to decrypt and QS Fix. When I manually run a show, it works as expected, and the file gets processed into the .mpg Output Dir. but Auto Transfers dont, the stay in the .Tivo Output Dir. I am gonna search the thread, but this question might be tricky to find...thanks!

Oh yeah, and I am running the auto transfers as a service, and the service runs under an account that has access to everything. The mpg Output Dir is a network drive mapping.

I think the key issue is the following:
"The mpg Output Dir is a network drive"
There was another user using a network drive as one of the output dirs but he was having same problem you specify. Turns out that the problem was in service mode kmttg didn't have access to network drive, and when that happens kmttg will reset to tivoDir or the kmttg installation dir. You should see something like the following in auto.log file if that is what is happening:
"Configured mpegDir does not exist, resetting to default"

Part of the problem may be service order start. If kmttg service starts before the network drive is mounted/available then that would be a problem. Other problem could be permissions issue if service is not using an account with proper permissions to see network drive.
Ultimately the user resolved his problem but unfortunately did not share all the details of exactly how he fixed it.

One experiment you can try is make sure network drive is mounted, then stop kmttg service and start it again and then see if you get the auto.log message I mentioned above and if not then it probably will work. Then it becomes a question of setting up service to start only after network mount is available which I'm not quite sure how one would go about doing.

It also may depend on how you are specifying the output dir. If you are not already you should use the following syntax for the network share instead of a network volume:
i.e. \\server\share
instead of via a network mounted volume such as:
h:\share

I think the key issue is the following:
"The mpg Output Dir is a network drive"
There was another user using a network drive as one of the output dirs but he was having same problem you specify. Turns out that the problem was in service mode kmttg didn't have access to network drive, and when that happens kmttg will reset to tivoDir or the kmttg installation dir. You should see something like the following in auto.log file if that is what is happening:
"Configured mpegDir does not exist, resetting to default"

Part of the problem may be service order start. If kmttg service starts before the network drive is mounted/available then that would be a problem. Other problem could be permissions issue if service is not using an account with proper permissions to see network drive.
Ultimately the user resolved his problem but unfortunately did not share all the details of exactly how he fixed it.

One experiment you can try is make sure network drive is mounted, then stop kmttg service and start it again and then see if you get the auto.log message I mentioned above and if not then it probably will work. Then it becomes a question of setting up service to start only after network mount is available which I'm not quite sure how one would go about doing.

I really appreciate the response. Sure enough, there were "Configured mpegDir does not exist" errors in the auto.log. Strange thing is, this was not after a reboot. The drive mapping is there, then I start the service, and I get the error. Again, the service is set up to run as my account which has access to the shares. Regardless, I did find the post from the person with the same question. He resolved it by creating a batch file that copies the completed files to the desired location, and has it called as a custom script in kmttg. One running now. Hopefully it works. Thanks again for the help!

It also may depend on how you are specifying the output dir. If you are not already you should use the following syntax for the network share instead of a network volume:
i.e. \\server\share
instead of via a network mounted volume such as:
h:\share

Just saw this post. Instead of the batch file, I am going to try the UNC approach. I assumed that would not work, but it looks like it does. I will let you know. Thanks!

Yes, tivodecode and comskip were updated for windows, only tivodecode for Mac. (tivodecode 0.3pre4 with TS support).
Thanks again AudioNutz (Bill) for the Mac tools zip file update as I don't have a Mac to be able to update that package myself.

First of all, I just found kmttg recently, and love it. Thanks so much!

However, I'm having issues with tivodecode. I'm on a Mac.

I think I have the latest version of kmttg (v0p7j) and the tivodecode from "kmttg_MacOSX_tools_v0p7j.zip".

When I download program streams, everything is fine. When I download as transport streams, things don't work so well. The files download faster, but tivodecode fails. It returns error 138 to kmttg, and you get "Bus error" when running it from the command line. The partially completed file is somewhat decrypted, but has severe macroblocking every few seconds.

When I download program streams, everything is fine. When I download as transport streams, things don't work so well. The files download faster, but tivodecode fails. It returns error 138 to kmttg, and you get "Bus error" when running it from the command line. The partially completed file is somewhat decrypted, but has severe macroblocking every few seconds.

Any thoughts?

Yes that's the right version. tivodecode with TS support is a relatively new development that some gracious anonymous user posted at the tivodecode sourceforge site, so there probably are some minor coding issues still to work out.
One question for you is does the TS format fail to decode for all programs you have tried from multiple channels or does it work right in some cases? Reason I ask is it has worked fine for other Premiere users, so the issue may well be headend, channel or show specific.
I haven't delved into the source code myself so can't really provide insight on what could be wrong but there may be others with experience with video editing that may be able to track down the issue with the help of some sample trouble videos.

EDIT: At least the Premiere still offers choice of TS & PS formats and the PS downloads reportedly (I don't have a Premiere myself) are still much faster than on S3/THD platforms, so that is still a good choice. tivodecode for PS formats has been proven to be very reliable over several years now so is rock solid.

Yes that's the right version. tivodecode with TS support is a relatively new development that some gracious anonymous user posted at the tivodecode sourceforge site, so there probably are some minor coding issues still to work out.
One question for you is does the TS format fail to decode for all programs you have tried from multiple channels or does it work right in some cases? Reason I ask is it has worked fine for other Premiere users, so the issue may well be headend, channel or show specific.
I haven't delved into the source code myself so can't really provide insight on what could be wrong but there may be others with experience with video editing that may be able to track down the issue with the help of some sample trouble videos.

EDIT: At least the Premiere still offers choice of TS & PS formats and the PS downloads reportedly (I don't have a Premiere myself) are still much faster than on S3/THD platforms, so that is still a good choice. tivodecode for PS formats has been proven to be very reliable over several years now so is rock solid.

At least 2 shows, one on the CW, one on ABC (I think).
It was on a mac mini, running 10.6.3. I'll try on my MacBook pro this weekend. I might even download Xcode and see if I can see where it's crashing.

When I download program streams, everything is fine. When I download as transport streams, things don't work so well. The files download faster, but tivodecode fails. It returns error 138 to kmttg, and you get "Bus error" when running it from the command line. The partially completed file is somewhat decrypted, but has severe macroblocking every few seconds.

Any thoughts?

Hmmm.... Usually "Bus Error" is one of those error messages that I get when I use an unsupported OS, or unsupported hardware. (Like a G4, or Tiger OS) I saw in one of your other messages that you're using the recently released 10.6.3 OS, and I cannot confirm nor deny that this is a supported OS with the tivodecode that I compiled last week.

I'm not jumping on 10.6.3 right now, because some of the 'other' tools that I use are not yet supported on that OS. It doesn't surprise me that this piece doesn't work with the 10.6.3 OS right now.

In the meantime, I'll try out a Transport stream with the latest/greatest that I've got...

...I cannot confirm nor deny that this is a supported OS with the tivodecode that I compiled last week.

Note that the same tivodecode works fine for PS decrypt which strongly suggests the compile and binary are fine.

SoBayJake, if you are willing to contribute a short TS clip of a troubled show along with your MAK you can P.M. me and we can go from there. Otherwise you are relegated to using PS downloads for now. I don't think this forum is appropriate for detailed discussions about tivodecode since technically it circumvents TiVo encryption and TiVo hacking discussions are forbidden here.

Greetings! Just getting starting trying to use this program -- picked up a TiVo Premiere earlier this week mainly because of the ability to get the improved transfer speeds. But so far, I'm coming up empty in my attempts to get kmttg to download anything.

It SEES the content in the TiVo, but when I attempt to download from it, I get a "Server Busy" error message, and then "Warning: Transient error. HTTP problem."

I believe it's installed properly, as well as the associated apps, but I can't get past this step. I also have TiVo Desktop installed, and that works. But perhaps that is causing a conflict? Any idea how to begin troubleshooting this?

Greetings! Just getting starting trying to use this program -- picked up a TiVo Premiere earlier this week mainly because of the ability to get the improved transfer speeds. But so far, I'm coming up empty in my attempts to get kmttg to download anything.

It SEES the content in the TiVo, but when I attempt to download from it, I get a "Server Busy" error message, and then "Warning: Transient error. HTTP problem."

I believe it's installed properly, as well as the associated apps, but I can't get past this step. I also have TiVo Desktop installed, and that works. But perhaps that is causing a conflict? Any idea how to begin troubleshooting this?

Thanks!

kmttg has a "Reset TiVo Web Server" option that you can try, or restart the TiVo DVR. My Series2 didn't correct itself using the "Reset TiVo Web Server", but did start working again after a restart of the DVR.

Note that the same tivodecode works fine for PS decrypt which strongly suggests the compile and binary are fine...

Now that I've done my little test, I can confirm that Transport Streams are working fine on the 10.6.2 version of the OS, with my MacBook Pro hardware. It may have something to do with 10.6.3, but like I mentioned I'm holding off with that update until Cisco updates their VPN stuff.

He could always compile his own directly on 10.6.3, and see if that changes things...

kmttg has a "Reset TiVo Web Server" option that you can try, or restart the TiVo DVR. My Series2 didn't correct itself using the "Reset TiVo Web Server", but did start working again after a restart of the DVR.

Well ain't that somethin' -- I tried the "Reset TiVo Web Server" option, but it didn't work. On your suggestion, I just restarted the TiVo, and now it's working!

Thanks!

Edit: Well, only-semi success as it turns out. For whatever reason, everything I select for transfer only partially completes. It seems to dump out at the same point in each show -- one might go to 100MB or so, while another will transfer 580MB and then stop. It seems to think it has finished -- no errors are returned. The same shows transfer completely with TiVo Desktop. (?)

Last edited by videojanitor; 04-03-2010 at 03:27 PM.
Reason: Added more info.

Note that the same tivodecode works fine for PS decrypt which strongly suggests the compile and binary are fine.

SoBayJake, if you are willing to contribute a short TS clip of a troubled show along with your MAK you can P.M. me and we can go from there. Otherwise you are relegated to using PS downloads for now. I don't think this forum is appropriate for detailed discussions about tivodecode since technically it circumvents TiVo encryption and TiVo hacking discussions are forbidden here.

I'm downloading XCode right now, and I'll try compiling to see if I can make any progress. Also downloading an episode of Lost that I'll try. And I'll make a few short recordings to see what I can get.

I realized one of the clips was transferred from my S3, so that might have something to do with it, I don't know. But I'll get some fresh clips recorded directly on the Premiere to test.

Well ain't that somethin' -- I tried the "Reset TiVo Web Server" option, but it didn't work. On your suggestion, I just restarted the TiVo, and now it's working!

Thanks!

Edit: Well, only-semi success as it turns out. For whatever reason, everything I select for transfer only partially completes. It seems to dump out at the same point in each show -- one might go to 100MB or so, while another will transfer 580MB and then stop. It seems to think it has finished -- no errors are returned. The same shows transfer completely with TiVo Desktop. (?)

It's not a good idea to run TiVo Desktop at the same time as you could be over-taxing the TiVo web server. I would suggest you pause TiVo Desktop. Better yet dump TiVo Desktop all together as the combination of kmttg and pyTivo IMO is a much better solution.

It's not a good idea to run TiVo Desktop at the same time as you could be over-taxing the TiVo web server. I would suggest you pause TiVo Desktop. Better yet dump TiVo Desktop all together as the combination of kmttg and pyTivo IMO is a much better solution.

Thanks for the info and suggestion -- I will do just that ...

<minutes elapse>

... OK, TiVo Desktop is gone. Same result when trying to download the two shows I tried before. Tried a third show, and it transferred fine. I suppose it's possible the other two are somehow corrupt, though TiVo Desktop transferred them. Is there a way to get kmttg to ignore the errors and keep on going?

... OK, TiVo Desktop is gone. Same result when trying to download the two shows I tried before. Tried a third show, and it transferred fine. I suppose it's possible the other two are somehow corrupt, though TiVo Desktop transferred them. Is there a way to get kmttg to ignore the errors and keep on going?

Since you are using this with a Premiere unit note that TiVo Desktop currently pulls the shows in mpeg2 Program Stream (PS) format only while for kmttg v0p7j it pulls them in mpeg2 Transport Stream (TS) format by default. So most likely if you change kmttg setting to pull in PS format instead the same pulls that worked with TiVo Desktop should also work with kmttg. Sounds like perhaps there are still some bugs with pulling in TS format? To use PS format in kmttg:
File->Configure...
Program Options tab
Disable "Download TiVo files in Transport Stream format"
OK

Let us know if that indeed is the problem as that would be an interesting tidbit and possibly another bug with Premiere units.

Let us know if that indeed is the problem as that would be an interesting tidbit and possibly another bug with Premiere units.

I have noticed that pulling in TS seems more sensitive to program stream errors. If there are a lot of errors in the stream, MPEG-PS may work while the faster MPEG-TS does not.

Oddly, this seems to be an issue with the latest software. I have a few "bad" recordings that downloaded fine in TS format under 14.0, but all I get are partial downloads in TS format under 14.1. They download fine in PS format.

I have noticed that pulling in TS seems more sensitive to program stream errors. If there are a lot of errors in the stream, MPEG-PS may work while the faster MPEG-TS does not.

Oddly, this seems to be an issue with the latest software. I have a few "bad" recordings that downloaded fine in TS format under 14.0, but all I get are partial downloads in TS format under 14.1. They download fine in PS format.

Same experience here, too. Running a TS format through the kmttg processes (including push) results in macro-blocking and skips every few seconds for me.

So most likely if you change kmttg setting to pull in PS format instead the same pulls that worked with TiVo Desktop should also work with kmttg. Sounds like perhaps there are still some bugs with pulling in TS format? [...] Let us know if that indeed is the problem as that would be an interesting tidbit and possibly another bug with Premiere units.

It seems you have correctly diagnosed this. The troubled shows transferred fine in PS mode. Of course it's slower, but at least that's a good workaround.

I saw others were having pixelation problems with TS files. I was too, and a reboot of the TiVo corrected it. tivodecode was happy with the new files, no more pixelation. I don't know how long it will last.

I think there's a gremlin in the TiVo code related to pulling things off the box. When it encrypts the TS, I think something goes awry.

Good feedback. Sounds like it's more reliable to keep in PS mode for now. Perhaps that's why TiVo hasn't bothered to update TiVo Desktop yet to support TS mode (even though obviously the TiVoDirectShowFilter dll does support TS).

Well, my experiences have been aggravating, and rather different than those reported here. Using a Premiere with v14.1a, along with kmttg-v0p7j.

1) Anything I download in PS mode can be loaded and played fine in VRD. However, if it's something I MRV'd over from my S3 because it always truncates there, it truncates in the same spot on the Primo, in PS mode. So no improvement on that front.

2) When I turn on TS mode for the download in kmttg, NOTHING is playable in VRD. It's all broken up and scrambled (and no sound). So it's not decoding properly. That's in VRD-Beta596. The earlier versions of VRD won't play them at all... just sit there forever in a Busy state, until I manually kill them.

3) If I use TS mode for the transfers, but click "Decrypt with tivodecode" (latest version that v0p7j grabbed), they then play "fine" in VRD (any version), but have sporadic bursts of black squares (on average every 3 seconds, though some files have both closer and farther spaced bursts... ~1-5 seconds).

4) using TS mode, I do get the full transfer for the files MRV'ed over from the S3. So it seems to solve the truncation issue. But with the problems from (2) and (3), it's not doing me much good.

It was my understanding (I read it somewhere... probably here) that VRD would have no problem with files transferred in TS mode. Maybe that changed between 14.0 and 14.1.

Also, the speeds that bkdtv reported in his benchmarks were fully born out. PS mode downloads, normally averaging 20 MBit/s on my S3 (with both tuners disabled), were 40 MBit/sec on the Primo. And in TS mode, that went to 60 MBit/s on average, though there were extended periods where I got 70-75 MBit/s! Pretty impressive speeds. Now if it only worked.

- Tim

P.S. Maybe rather than referring to my Premiere as "Primo", I should be calling it "Preemie".

3) If I use TS mode for the transfers, but click "Decrypt with tivodecode" (latest version that v0p7j grabbed), they then play "fine" in VRD (any version), but have sporadic bursts of black squares (on average every 3 seconds, though some files have both closer and farther spaced bursts... ~1-5 seconds).

Sounds like tivodecode is not decrypting all video frames for that case.

I think it has been well established that TS mode can be very unreliable for both downloading and decrypting. TS decryption is better handled by TiVoDirectShowFilter (used by VideoRedo) than tivodecode, but both can have problems.

Bottom line. If you have any problems then turn off TS download mode. Since PS downloads are still much faster than THD/S3 units I think that would be my choice for reliability reasons.